End All Instances of a Running Process

Category:

System/API

Type:

Snippets

Difficulty:

Advanced

Author:

Intelligent Solutions Inc.

Version Compatibility:

More information:

This example takes a window caption as a parameter and ends all instances of any process in which a window contains any part of that caption. See comments for cautions in using this function.

Instructions: Copy the declarations and code below and paste directly into your VB project.

Declarations:
Option Explicit Private Const PROCESS_ALL_ACCESS = &H1F0FFF Private Declare Function GetWindowText Lib "user32" _ Alias "GetWindowTextA" (ByVal hWnd As Long, ByVal lpString As _ String, ByVal cch As Long) As Long Private Declare Function GetWindowTextLength Lib "user32" _ Alias "GetWindowTextLengthA" (ByVal hWnd As Long) As Long Private Declare Function GetNextWindow Lib "user32" _ Alias "GetWindow" (ByVal hWnd As Long, ByVal wFlag As Long) _ As Long Private Declare Function OpenProcess Lib "kernel32" (ByVal dwDesiredAccess As Long, _ ByVal bInheritHandle As Long, ByVal dwProcessId As Long) As Long Private Declare Function GetWindowThreadProcessId Lib "user32" _ (ByVal hWnd As Long, lpdwProcessId As Long) As Long Private Declare Function GetExitCodeProcess Lib "kernel32" _ (ByVal hProcess As Long, lpExitCode As Long) As Long Private Declare Function TerminateProcess Lib "kernel32" _ (ByVal hProcess As Long, ByVal uExitCode As Long) As Long

Code:

Public Function EndAllInstances(ByVal WindowCaption As String) _
  As Boolean
'*********************************************
'PURPOSE: ENDS ALL RUNNING INSTANCES OF A PROCESS
'THAT CONTAINS ANY PART OF THE WINDOW CAPTION

'INPUT: ANY PART OF THE WINDOW CAPTION

'RETURNS: TRUE IF SUCCESSFUL (AT LEASE ONE PROCESS WAS STOPPED,
'FALSE OTHERWISE)

'EXAMPLE EndProcess "Notepad"

'NOTES:
'1. THIS IS DESIGNED TO TERMINATE THE PROCESS IMMEDIATELY,
'   THE APP WILL NOT RUN THROUGH IT'S NORMAL SHUTDOWN PROCEDURES
'   E.G., THERE WILL BE NO DIALOG BOXES LIKE "ARE YOU SURE
'   YOU WANT TO QUIT"

'2. BE CAREFUL WHEN USING:
'   E.G., IF YOU CALL ENDPROCESS("A"), ANY PROCESS WITH A 
'   WINDOW THAT HAS THE LETTER "A" IN ITS CAPTION WILL BE 
'   TERMINATED

'3. AS WRITTEN, ALL THIS CODE MUST BE PLACED WITHIN
'   A FORM MODULE

'***********************************************
Dim hWnd As Long
Dim hInst As Long
Dim hProcess As Long
Dim lProcessID
Dim bAns As Boolean
Dim lExitCode As Long
Dim lRet As Long

On Error GoTo ErrorHandler

If Trim(WindowCaption) = "" Then Exit Function
Do
hWnd = FindWin(WindowCaption)
If hWnd = 0 Then Exit Do
hInst = GetWindowThreadProcessId(hWnd, lProcessID)
'Get handle to process
hProcess = OpenProcess(PROCESS_ALL_ACCESS, 0&, lProcessID)
If hProcess <> 0 Then
    'get exit code
    GetExitCodeProcess hProcess, lExitCode
        If lExitCode <> 0 Then
                'bye-bye
            lRet = TerminateProcess(hProcess, lExitCode)
            If bAns = False Then bAns = lRet > 0
        End If
End If
Loop

EndAllInstances = bAns
ErrorHandler:

End Function

Private Function FindWin(WinTitle As String) As Long

Dim lhWnd As Long, sAns As String
Dim sTitle As String

lhWnd = Me.hWnd
sTitle = LCase(WinTitle)

DoEvents
      If lhWnd = 0 Then Exit Do
        sAns = LCase$(GetCaption(lhWnd))

If InStr(sAns, sTitle) Then

FindWin = lhWnd
          Exit Do
       Else
         FindWin = 0
       End If

lhWnd = GetNextWindow(lhWnd, 2)

Loop

End Function

Private Function GetCaption(lhWnd As Long) As String

Dim sAns As String, lLen As Long

lLen& = GetWindowTextLength(lhWnd)
    sAns = String(lLen, 0)
    Call GetWindowText(lhWnd, sAns, lLen + 1)
   GetCaption = sAns

End Function